


All I know for sure is I'm trying

by CractasticDispatches



Series: A collection of Xena drabbles [1]
Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: F/F, Pre-Slash, Sins of the Past canon twist, because canon-twisting is our jam, oh Xena you were never actually going to get rid of this one were you?, touch-starved warrior princesses have no idea what to do with overly touchy traveling companions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-30
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-27 15:10:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2697479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CractasticDispatches/pseuds/CractasticDispatches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The first thing Xena notices about the girl is that she’s got courage. Tiny and unarmed and absolutely no match for the warrior thugs who surround her, and still she stands up to them. Tries to bargain. And then to fight, cursing and kicking, her sprit far more indomitable than her body, and it rouses something inside of Xena. Respect, of a sorts. And something else. Something she can’t quite name, but it’s made up of the girl’s fury, her outright indignation at being forced into anything and the way she fights, the way she tries. The way she is still so innocent.</i>
  <br/>
  <i>And so Xena has to save her.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	All I know for sure is I'm trying

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by the amazing [Damkianna](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Damkianna), who is lovely and puts up with us and our insane sentence structures with more patience than we deserve.

It’s hard. It’s not exactly like she expected it to be easy, but when she took her leave of it all — of war, of Ares, her army, Hercules — somehow she never quite thought it would be like this.

Everywhere holds memories. A town she raided. A field where her army once rode. A cave where they held hostages. Before the memories aways felt like victory, like power, but now all she can hear is the screaming, and it is not the sound she used to think.

The survivors are almost worse. She knows she should be grateful that there are any — whatever else she may have done, whatever evils she may have committed, at least a full-scale massacre will never ride on her conscience — but the looks on the people’s faces as they tell of what happened, the fear and the naked hatred in their eyes as they whisper her name — Xena thinks that might actually be worse than the memories.

It’s bad when they recognize her. When they know who she is. Her reputation always seems to precede her and where once she prized that, that everywhere people already knew to be afraid, to run or surrender, now it just seems like a barrier. A thing set between herself and her new path, making it impossible for her to ever truly set foot on it.

Several times she tries. To explain, to apologize, to help. To by some action — any action — prove that she’s changed. That she is no longer the warlord that she was. But without Hercules, hero of the people, beloved by all, to stand by her side and swear to their safety, none of them believe her _(she never did stop to wonder, when she traveled with him, if that was the reason. If the people only accepted her because their hero had vouched for her. But she should have. Pure foolishness to believe it had ever been anything else)._ After a month or so of trying, she finally gives up. Telling people who she is only gets in her way.

It doesn’t help. Oh, it works, sometimes. They don’t know who she is. Most people don’t recognize her, so as long as she never speaks her name, they let her help. Let her fix what she can. But it doesn’t change anything. _She_ knows. She knows who she is. And she knows what would be. The man whose arm she helps to splint would spit in her face if she told him her name. The boy who smiles when she gives him her food would run in terror from the monster who killed his whole family _(and it is only that, she’s sure — that she looks human — that keeps him from knowing; still too young to have realized that the worst monsters always_ are _human. Always_ do _look like her)_.

That any of them thank her or smile only makes it worse. They wouldn’t if they knew and their thanks and their smiles are all lies. Lies that she lets them keep telling. Keep living. And she doesn’t deserve it. They should hate her. They _do_ hate her. They have every right to and Xena doesn’t know if it’s cowardice or something else, something more, that keeps her from telling them, but she does know that it’s wrong.

Of all the monstrous things she’s ever done, letting people smile and thank her for her help when they really should just kill her might be the most monstrous of all.

  


She buries everything. All of her armor, all of her weapons, even the leather bodice and battle-skirt. She won’t need them, not now. If she cannot make a clean start then at least she might be able to have a clean end and nothing about any of those things is clean.

Pushing the last of the dirt over the sword hilt, she thinks at first that the sounds are still just memories. More screams from her past and why not? What else would she hear in a moment like this? But the ground trembles beneath her hands and someone runs past and Xena backs quickly into the brush. Is she hallucinating now? Have the memories stolen even her sanity and sent all her past victims to her in some perverse farewell?

But no. No, it can’t be. The men out on the road are not her men and the group of villagers they chase are wholly unfamiliar to her, though perhaps the situation is not. The men corral the villagers, careful not to kill, and Xena knows a slave-raid when she sees one.

The one in charge, a broad, burly man, speaks. Tells the people that fighting is pointless. They’re mostly unarmed and completely untrained; they would only get themselves killed after all. A few people scream. A girl at the front starts to cry and Xena crouches frozen in the bushes and doesn’t know what to do. Because this is wrong. These people don’t deserve this. But this is how the world is. How it works. What she wants to leave behind. What she needs to be able to walk away from.

“No!” And Xena stares in shock as another girl suddenly throws herself forwards, arms outstretched as if to protect the people behind her. “Take me. Let the others go.”

It’s an insane thing to do. This girl is no warrior, barely even knows how to stand ready. She’s unarmed and outnumbered and out-massed by every single one of the men and she _is_ afraid. Xena can see it, the way she keeps shifting her weight and the tiny, almost imperceptible trembling in her body. But she doesn’t run or back down and her eyes as she stares at the man before her are fierce. And when he reaches out to touch her she slaps his hand away with a defiance that Xena hasn’t seen in a long time.

It’s going to get her killed, that defiance. The man snarls and reaches for his whip and the girl’s eyes go wide and afraid and _furious_ as she steps back, arms still outstretched, still trying to protect her people and suddenly it doesn’t matter anymore. It doesn’t matter that she wanted to walk away from all this, it doesn’t matter that she’s no hero to be saving people. It doesn’t matter that her weapons are buried or that she wears only the soft, undyed underbodice that goes beneath the leather. It doesn’t even matter that it’s wrong or right or just the way the world works.

All that matters is this girl. Her fury, her outright indignation at being forced into anything and the way she fights, the way she tries. The way she is still so innocent. Still believes in something more. Something better than all of this.

And so Xena has to save her.

  


Her name is Gabrielle. Xena learns it when the people let her come back to their village with them to put her things back on. Xena makes no attempt this time to hide from them who she is, and she can see that they know. That they’ve heard. Can see the wave of unease — shifting glances and quiet murmurs — that the sound of her name sets off, and she wonders whether it’s gratitude or just fear that stops them from trying to get rid of her.

Gabrielle is the only one who seems unfazed. She checks a few of her people first — an older woman who’s probably her mother, the crying girl who turns out to be her sister — then comes bounding over to walk beside Xena.

“That was amazing. You were amazing. Where did you learn to do all that?”

Xena turns her head to look at the girl. All the others are keeping their distance; walking around her or keeping off to one side. Staying out of range. But Gabrielle seems to have no such worries.

“I’ve never seen anyone fight like that,” she says. “Well, not that I’ve seen that much fighting, actually. But still.”

Xena looks ahead again and keeps walking. What can she say, anyway?

“I’ve heard the stories, you know,” Gabrielle continues, apparently not needing any response to keep talking. “They did not do you justice.”

Justice? Xena wonders just exactly what kind of stories it is that the girl has been listening to, to say something like that. She suppresses a snort and turns to check behind them. It’s probably not necessary; after the beating they took it’s unlikely that Draco’s men would make a second attempt. Not now, anyways. Far more likely that they’ll return to their camp to report. To deliver her message. But the villagers aren’t organized enough to keep a rear guard. And that may not have been the only group Draco had out. And it keeps her from having to say anything.

“You’re bleeding.”Gabrielle’s voice sounds startled, and maybe also a little indignant. Like she was when she stood before the men, like she thinks it’s inherently wrong for one of the ‘good guys’ to get hurt, never mind the fact that anyone who chooses to fight, good or bad, opens themselves up to injury. Never mind that good and bad are so far from simple or that Xena’s not even sure which side she falls on anymore.

Beneath the surprise and anger there’s also a hint of something else. Something Xena thinks might be genuine concern, which is ridiculous and completely unnecessary and she opens her mouth to tell Gabrielle that she’s fine, that it’s nothing, when suddenly Gabrielle is right behind her, pushing Xena’s hair out of the way and standing on tip-toe so she can see. And Xena freezes, the words dying in her throat before they can ever make it out into the air.

“Does it hurt?” Gabrielle asks. “It looks like it hurts. Well, it’s bleeding. You don’t move like it hurts, though. Maybe it’s like they say; about fighting making you too focused to feel pain.”

Fingers move against Xena’s skin, shifting more hair aside. Tracing carefully up her shoulder and neck towards her hairline. She can feel the faint slickness where those fingers encounter blood as Gabrielle tries to figure out what’s actual damage and what’s just mess.

“I don’t think it’s too bad,” Gabrielle says. “There’s kind of a lot of blood, though. Here, hold on—”

The hands retreat for a moment and Gabrielle digs around in her bag. She pulls out a rag and presses it to the cut.

“It’s not much, I know,” she says. “But it’s clean. My mother’s got some stuff that helps with bleeding. Lila and I were always getting hurt when we were little. Hold this for a second?”

Xena reaches up without thinking. Places her hand on the cloth to keep it in place. People don’t touch her. Not without permission. Not unless they’ve got a deathwish. And Gabrielle just saw her fighting. Knows what she’s capable of — well, some of it, anyway. She managed, somehow, to get through the fight without killing anyone. Without hardly drawing any blood, even, and she has no idea how she did it. How she held back. No idea why, either; it’s not as though the men deserved any mercy. But there are enough memories already. And a pair of bright, innocent eyes were watching.

Still, Gabrielle saw enough. Enough that she should know. Should keep her distance, like the others. What is she thinking, touching someone like Xena like she’s just another person?

Gabrielle takes the sash from her waist and ties it around Xena’s shoulder. It’s a bit awkward, the gash too high and too close to her head to really be easy to bandage, but Gabrielle manages to bundle the rag so it will hold, at least for a little while.

“There,” the girl says, stepping away a little. “At least you won’t bleed all the way back.”

She starts off again, following the rest of the villagers, most of whom are ahead of them now. Xena stares at her, trying to unlock her body. Unlock her mind. Who _is_ this girl?

Realizing Xena isn’t following her, Gabrielle turns around. “Xena.” And it is her name; Gabrielle didn’t just mishear. Doesn’t think she’s someone else. “Xena, are you coming?”

And though Xena will never quite know why, she does. Freshens her grip on Agro’s reins and goes. Falls in beside the girl. Can’t think what else to do. And it still doesn’t seem to matter that she has nothing to say, that she just walks along in silence. Gabrielle just smiles and talks and doesn’t seem to notice the wide birth everyone else is giving them — giving her — all the way to the village.

  


She’s still asking questions as Xena finishes putting her armor back on — about the chakram, about her fighting skills, begging Xena to teach her. Gabrielle’s mother and sister stand behind her, doing what they can for the cut on her neck. They don’t need to, it’s hardly serious, and the bleeding has mostly stopped, but they insisted. Well, Gabrielle insisted and Hecuba, her mother, probably felt just indebted enough to Xena for saving her daughters that she didn’t refuse.

It hardly means she’s welcome, though. As she finishes lacing her boots, Herodotus, Gabrielle’s father, and several of the other men come in; strength in numbers after all. Or that’s the theory anyway.

“Xena, we’d like you to move on.” And the way he says it — firm but with an edge, like he’s trying be in control but is still just afraid of what might happen, of what she might do — grates on her, though she can hardly blame him for it.

“Move on?” Gabrielle repeats, looking startled, and then indignant again. “Father, she should rest here until—”

“Daughter, hush,” Herodotus snaps, eyes flashing warning. Then he turns back to Xena. “We don’t want any trouble with you. We’re grateful for your help, but we know your reputation. We just want you to leave.”

“But Father—”

“It’s alright,” Xena cuts in. Gabrielle needn’t waste her breath; her injury is hardly life-threatening. And their reaction to her presence is hardly surprising. “I plan to move on, anyway.”

Gabrielle’s eyes dart to her face and Xena thinks she might actually look disappointed. Everyone else looks relieved, though. Herodotus nods. “Don’t take too long.”

The men move to leave, taking Gabrielle’s mother and sister with them. One of them tries to take Gabrielle as well, but the girl is having none of it.

“Just because we’re betrothed, it doesn’t mean you can boss me around,” she snaps, and Xena almost pities the man. Betrothed or not, he’s clearly no match for Gabrielle. “I want to stay and talk to Xena.”

He joins the others leaving and Gabrielle watches them, waits til everyone else is gone, then spins back around and sits on a stool and fixes Xena with a look that she would almost call imploring, except that she knows better.

“You’ve got to take me with you,” Gabrielle says. “You can’t leave me here.”

Xena blinks. “Why?” She has to take Gabrielle with her? Even if there were a world in which that particular leap of logic made any sense at all, what on earth makes Gabrielle think Xena would want that? _(What on earth makes_ Gabrielle _want that?)_

“Did you see the guy they want me to marry?”

“He seems like a gentle soul.” Xena stands and starts gathering her things. “That’s rare in a man.”

Gabrielle snorts. “It’s not the gentle part I have a problem with. It’s the dull, stupid part.” And Xena can’t quite help smiling at that. But she can’t take the girl with her. It’d be far too dangerous.

“I travel alone,” she says.

Gabrielle sighs. “So where are you headed now?”

“Amphipolis.”

“That’s in Thrace, isn’t it?” Gabrielle asks innocently. “I love to study maps and place names. What route do you usually take.”

Subtlety is clearly not this girl’s strong suit. Just another reason why she shouldn’t come. “Don’t even think about it,” Xena warns.

“What?”

“Following me.” Xena slings her pack over her shoulder and picks up her sword and belt, then turns around. Gabrielle stares up at her, bright and innocent and hopeful. Gods. Doesn’t she realize who she’s talking to? Xena raises her eyebrows and makes her voice as dangerous as she dares without actually terrifying the girl. “You don’t want to make me mad, now, do you?”

Gabrielle doesn’t look frightened, but some of the hope, the brightness, falls from her face as she shakes her head, and something twists in Xena’s stomach. And she’s been swimming in guilt for months now, the feeling so huge and so terrible she thought she’d be sick with it, so this shouldbe nothing by comparison. _Is_ nothing by comparison. Gabrielle’s disappointment is as nothing to the devastation Xena’s left in her wake before, nothing to the burnt villages and a boy left without parents. And it’s the right thing to do, anyway. Someone as innocent as Gabrielle would never survive on the road. Would never survive someone like Xena.

Xena turns and marches to the door and tries to pretend she doesn’t feel those eyes on her all the way there. That the guilt doesn’t follow her even out the door and to the hitching post where Argo waits. She ties her packs to the saddle, straps the sword-belt back around her waist, unties the mare.

She can’t quite help glancing back though, half-expecting Gabrielle to be watching her from the door or one of the windows. But she’s not. Xena pauses for a moment, then shakes herself. It’s not like it matters. She mounts up.

Still, as she nudges Argo’s sides with her heels and sets off for home, she supposes she can make a short detour. For a warlord, Draco’s always been honorable in a way. Keeps his word. And he owes her, sort of. His army will leave Potidaea alone, she’ll make sure of it.

  


When she hears Draco’s men behind her, she’s curious, and immediately suspicious. Draco may have agreed to leave Potidaea alone, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t up to something else. And when she doubles back and sees that the man in the lead is Hector, the one from the raiding party, the one she thrashed so soundly and who was going to whip Gabrielle, she just can’t resist. She picks off his men one by one, stealing them off their horses and knocking them out before they can make any noise. Hector never so much as looks back to check, too sure of her being ahead to bother, the fool. Even when she drops down onto the last remaining horse and rides behind him, he notices nothing. Only when he comes upon Argo, riderless and grazing, does he turn and realize she’s there.

The look on his face — two parts shock, one part denial; like he can’t even work out what’s happening or how _(well, probably he can’t)_ — is priceless, and Xena laughs as he surges forward and maybe Hercules wouldn’t approve, but by the gods, she’s missed this. The way everyone always underestimates her. The looks on their faces when they realize what’s going on. Who actually controls the board.

She spurs her borrowed mount forward and unhorses him easily, then leaps down and jabs her fingers into his neck.

“I’ve just cut off the flow of blood to your brain,” she tells him. “You’ll be dead in twenty seconds unless I release you. Now why are you following me?”

He glares up at her and tries to move, not that it gets him anywhere.

“Ten seconds,” she says calmly. It actually takes at least thirty seconds, but Hector hardly needs to know that. Besides, it’s fun to watch him squirm a little.

“Draco sent me,” Hector rasps out, voice hurried and just a bit panicked and Xena smirks. So easy. “He plans to destroy your home valley.”

The smile drops off her lips. Draco’s going after Amphipolis? She doesn’t need to ask why to know it has something to do with her; revenge or punishment for turning him down when he asked her to join him, a ploy, or maybe just for fun, it hardly matters. He saw her and now he’s going to march on her home and she doesn’t know if the thing she feels is more anger or disgust, but there is no way in Tartarus she’s going to let him hurt anything that is hers.

She looks down at Hector. And he is a fool, and cruel and dishonorable and she’d be doing Draco a favor, really, letting him die. But it would probably also be wrong. And she doesn’t really feel like doing Draco any favors.

She bends down and jabs the release points, then runs to mount Argo again, spurring the mare towards home. Whatever Draco intends, he may have just provided her with what she needs; an easy way to prove herself. Because if Draco is attacking Amphipolis, then that means they’ll need her help.

  


It feels like home. Xena knows it won’t be that simple, that she can’t really expect her people to just welcome her back with open arms. The sorrow and the pain she caused them runs too deep for things to be that easy. Still, riding in over the hills and seeing the familiar sight — her home spread out before her and the people out in the fields — everything feels so familiar, so exactly as she remembers from so many years ago that she can’t quite help thinking it might be. That maybe she really can do it. Can really just come home again. These are her people, after all. Her friends and family. The ones who have known her the longest, who would remember her as a child. Who know how it all started. That at least at first she did what she did for the right reasons. Surely they can find a way to see past what she became. To see that she’s changed.

Her eyes search the town and find her mother’s tavern, steam rising out the back from the kitchens and people moving in and out, and her heart swells. She should have come home long ago.

The feeling doesn’t last, though. She can feel eyes on her as soon as she dismounts, and though she tries to shake it — newcomers are always eyed in a town, she knows that — their gazes make her spine prickle and her hand goes to her sword hilt out of habit, the solidness of the grip against her palm steadying. Then she makes herself let go. She can’t go in like that, not if she wants them to see. To understand. And they will, they have to. They need to.

Xena takes a breath, then marches in.

She hears it start almost as soon as she crosses the threshold. People whispering her name, staring at her and then turning away quick. Leaning over to their neighbors. The ones that don’t turn away are worse. Their eyes glare accusation at her and though she squares her shoulders and keeps walking, keeps her face carefully blank as if she doesn’t care, doesn’t feel the weight of those gazes, of those accusations, part of her suddenly wishes she had never come.

A woman enters, her dark hair as long and thick as Xena’s own and her face as familiar to her as this valley and Xena wants to smile to see her, but the look on Cyrene’s face stops her.

When Xena thinks of home, this is the woman she remembers. The mother who used to wash and bandage her cuts, who scolded her for dragging Lyceus to the lake. Who kissed her forehead and tucked her in at night. Who never stopped calling her ‘little one,’ even when Xena grew to be a full head taller than her. A kind, warm person who always kept her peace.

But there is none of that peace on Cyrene’s face now.

“Mother?” Xena says, and her voice comes out more uncertain then it should, more than she’d like, as Cyrene strides up to her. She says nothing, just looks at Xena for a moment, then reaches forward and draws the sword from Xena’s side. For a long moment, she doesn’t say anything, just stands there holding the sword up, point aimed at Xena’s throat, as if she were considering. And Cyrene is no warrior, trained to the sword and to the kill, and Xena doesn’t think she’d do it, but she knows what this moment is for. It’s to let her wonder. To know that maybe, maybe Cyrene would. That she could, if she chose, and all Xena can do is stand there and wait.

“Weapons aren’t welcome in my tavern,” Cyrene says finally, pulling the sword back and placing it on a table. “Neither are you,” she adds, and her voice is hard in a way Xena doesn’t remember ever hearing from her childhood. Cyrene blows out a breath and brushes past her, picking up goblets from an empty table. “What are you doing here?”

“Mother, listen,” Xena says. Tries. “The warlord Draco is marching on this valley.”

“And you need to borrow a few men for an army, right?”

She should hear it, the tone in her mother’s voice. Should realize. But she doesn’t. Can only hear the words that sound like an acceptance. Like an in. “I can help organize a defense—”

“Give it up, Xena.” And now she does hear it, the trick. The trap laid for her in her own words. This is what she used to do, what she said at the beginning. And so it’s exactly what they expect of her now. Still, she has to try.

“I know Draco,” she says. “I know the way he thinks, I know what his weaknesses are.” She looks around; if nothing else they should remember that she’s good at this. That this is something she can do. “If we act now, we stand a good chance of stopping him.”

“You think we’re fools!” Cyrene snaps, whirling back to face her and the look in her eyes is as unfamiliar as her voice. “We all remember what happened the last time you talked like that.”

Others chime in at that, angry, almost defiant, and Xena stares. Do they not even believe her that Draco is coming? Why would she lie about that?

“You’re all in great danger.” Don’t they understand?

“Even if that were true,” Cyrene says, “we would rather die before accepting help from you again.” She picks up the bundle of plates and goblets she’s been gathering up and faces Xena again. “Go away, Xena,” she says. “This is not your town anymore. We are not your people.” She starts to walk back to the kitchens, then turns back one last time to add, “I am not your mother!”

And then she’s gone. Gone and Xena stands in the center of the tavern and hears the words, her people echoing her mother’s feelings back to her, telling her to go, to leave. To never come back. But she won’t let them see. Won’t give them the satisfaction of knowing how it hurts.She turns on her heel and storms out and back to Argo, leaping into the saddle and dragging at the reins. Kicking the mare harder than she should to ride hard and fast back up the hills to the forest as if she could outrun the pain. Outrun the words. The rejection.

She only realizes she’s forgotten her sword when she dismounts and reaches for the hilt; trees are hardly worthy opponents but she needs something to do and the wood will go to the fire anyway. But the sword isn’t there, left back on a table in the tavern that belongs to a women who is not her mother anymore in a town that no longer wants her.

Xena grabs her chakram. Throws it into a nearby log. Tries to scream but the sound catches in her throat and she turns and buries her face in Argo’s mane and tries to breathe.

  


She goes back in the morning. Has to, for the sword. She could get another, she supposes, but that one is hers, and maybe it’s foolishness, getting so attached to objects, but they’re all she seems to have left anymore.

She doesn’t expect Cyrene to be there. She should, but she doesn’t and the way her face changes, shuts down the moment she sees Xena makes Xena want to hate her and cry all at once. Instead she just sheathes the sword. Turns to go. Stops.

Draco and his men are still coming.

“If you won’t mount a defense then you must leave here,” she says. It’s what half of them wanted to do last time anyway and Xena hated the idea then and she hates it now, but if they won’t let her help then it’s all they have left.

“You came all this way just to say that?”

Xena hesitates, then turns back. “No,” she says. “It wasn’t the only reason.”

Cyrene sighs. “What other purpose could you have?” she asks and her voice is so tired and maybe Xena isn’t the only one here who’s hurting.

“I wanted to come home,” she admits, eyes flicking to her mother’s face and then away again to the floor. “I thought maybe this time I could get it right.” It sounds so stupid out loud, of course she can’t come home. Not after everything that happened. After everything she did. She should have known.

“I don’t think anything will ever take away the shame and sorrow you’ve brought on your kinsmen,” Cyrene says and Xena closes her eyes.

“Probably not,” she says. “But I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying.”

“Xena.” Her name comes out like a sigh and it’s sad and it’s tired and Xena knows exactly what it feels like. “I wish I could believe you.”

Xena opens her mouth, though she has no idea what to say, what she can say, but before she can even begin to try a commotion outside makes her stop. Turn.

A group of people come into the tavern carrying rocks and pitchforks and Xena knows the look of a mob as well as she knows the look of a raiding party, though she can’t think why they’re here. She’s done nothing, not this time.

“We know what you’re up to, Xena,” says a man; Xena remembers him from before and though Adamos is older now, he was always well-respected. She has no doubt that the people will rally behind him now just as before. “We won’t let you get away with it.”

“What are you talking about?” Cyrene asks.

“Her army is burning fields in the west valley.”

“That’s a lie,” Xena growls, then turns back to her mother. “It’s Draco’s army.” It has to be, who else would be marching on Amphipolis.

“Then why are they carrying _your_ banners and shouting _your_ name?” Adamos challenges and now Xena knows why Draco is doing this. What his purpose was. He couldn’t go home himself and now he’ll make sure she can’t either.

Behind her, Xena hears the sharp sound of Cyrene’s breath. “Do what you will with her.” And Xena turns, tries to catch her mother’s eyes — surely, surely Cyrene can’t believe this. Knows that she would never attack her own people, not for anything. But Cyrene is already gone and all Xena can do is stare after her.

“You should have stayed with your army, Xena,” someone says, and Xena turns back. Faces the crowd. “This is the last village you’ll ever see.”

Xena stares. Raises one eyebrow. Do they really think they can do it? These people never fought before, couldn’t stomach the violence or the death even when it was for their own defense, what makes them think they can stomach cold-blooded murder now?

“Well,” she challenges, “what are you waiting for? Take your revenge.” No one moves. She sneers at them. “It’s true what they say; it’s sweet. What?” she adds, when still no one moves. Dares. “Is one woman too much for you?” Gods, but they’re cowards and the disgust churns in her belly and at least it’s better than the pain. “Let me even the odds.”

She draws her sword and there are quiet gasps and several people draw back and this, _this_ is what they think of her. That she would attack them, would slaughter them all in her mother’s tavern, she who fought for them. Who risked her life for them. Who shed blood and gave up her innocence to protect them while they hid safe in their homes. She drops the sword on the table.

“One unarmed woman might be more to your tastes.”

Still no one moves and Xena hates the way even this victory sings in her blood because they’ll never do it. They don’t have the conviction. Don’t have the strength. And then a girl at the front, one she doesn’t know, doesn’t remember, too young to have been more than a child the last time Xena was here, raises her chin and throws.

Another stone follows, and then another and another and she doesn’t know what to do, disgust and victory washed away by a wave of shock so strong it’s like incomprehension. These are her people, not violent. Not murderers. And she doesn’t want to hurt them, doesn’t want to die, doesn’t want to apologize for the only monstrous thing she ever did with _good_ intentions, doesn’t want any of it.

And she stands and stares and tries to think — to feel anything other than shock — to think of any way out of this other than to fight or—

“Wait, wait, wait!” And Gabrielle, of all people, comes pushing her way through through the crowd. She throws herself in front of Xena as soon as she’s free of them, one hand stretched back towards Xena as though to keep her back, to protect her, the other reaching out to the crowd, palm open in entreaty.

And Xena stares at her in wonder. Because it made sense when it was Gabrielle’s own people the girl was trying to protect — her mother, her sister — Xena can understand that. But this?

“Unless you’re suicidal, get out of the way,” Adamos says as Gabrielle shifts from foot to foot, glancing back over her shoulder at Xena. She wonders if the look the girl gives her is meant to reassure her or just to make sure she’s still there, still okay. Couldn’t even say for sure right now that she is okay. Nothing that’s happened in the last thirty seconds makes any sense.

“She’s brought Draco down on the valley,” Adamos continues, and the tiny part of Xena’s mind that still functions wants to hit him because now, _now_ he believes her? Now he says it’s Draco’s army and not hers?

“Draco?” Gabrielle repeats, still holding up her hands. “Now, he’s a scary guy. And I can understand why you’re upset. But let me throw some logic at you.”

Logic? She’s up against a lynch mob and the girl wants to talk her way out of this?

“You’re wasting your breath,” Adamos says. “We’ll never put our faith in Xena again. I buried two sons because of her. Now get out of the way.”

Several people raise their arms, stones at the ready and Xena half-flinches without meaning to _(her people, her own people)_ and Gabrielle actually huffs. Puts her hands on her hips.

“Oh, come on,” she says. “You didn’t even bring enough stones for a proper stoning.”

And this is ridiculous and Xena feels like an idiot, hiding behind this tiny slip of a girl — she who conquered kingdoms — and yet for all that, she could almost laugh when she sees the way the people are suddenly trading looks with each other. The way they suddenly seem unsure.

“We can get more,” someone says, and several stones are raised again, and Gabrielle’s hands jump back up into the air.

“You could,” she says quickly. “Of course you could. But then what? I mean,” she shrugs, hands coming down a little as the crowd backs off a bit to listen, “let’s say you’re right, and she’s Draco’s buddy. Let’s say she’s even his girlfriend. Well, what have you accomplished?” She sidles up to Adamos, hands still up a bit, but it’s more casual now. Not so shifting or defensive. “You think Draco’s bad news now? What do you think he’ll be like when he hears you’ve knocked off his woman? Oh boy,” she shudders, “give’s me the creeps even to think about it.”

And it’s impressive. Not just that she’s managed to find an argument that’s actually working, and on the fly, too, but the way she instinctively works the room. Keeps herself between Xena and the crowd without staying on the defensive, angling her body to make her posture open and talking to them like she’s on their side, even though it’s clear that she’s still trying to get Xena out of this.

Xena waits. Watches. There’s a moment, an exchange of looks by the crowd and then, “Alright,” Adamos growls. “But get Xena out of here.” Talking to Gabrielle like that’s something she can do. Like it’s something he thinks he can trust her to do.

Gabrielle puts up her hand again, but it’s different this time. Like bargaining. Like this was just a marketplace haggle and she’s just made an agreement.

“No problem,” she says, backing towards Xena again. She turns and picks up Xena’s sword and hands it to her. Xena takes it. Slides it back into her scabbard. Stares and stares at Gabrielle, trying to work out what just happened. Trying to work out _how_ it happened.

Gabrielle flashes a cheerful smile at the crowd then gives Xena a significant look and jerks her eyes towards the door. Xena shakes herself. Grabs her chakram out of the girl’s hands and stalks towards the crowd, not bothering to look behind her to see if Gabrielle is there. She doesn’t have to; she can feel the girl there. Feel her following. Feel her _smiling_ , like everything is fine.

But no one tries to stop them leaving. And somehow, Xena doesn’t think it’s just the sword at her side that holds them back.

  


“You know, I could probably get up there behind you,” Gabrielle says as Xena ties her pack to Argo’s saddle and checks the girth.

“What are you talking about?” Xena asks wearily. Gabrielle’s chatter is the last thing she needs right now. Her people don’t want her, her mother won’t lift her banishment, and Draco is still coming and if they won’t listen to her, then there’s nothing she can do.

And she hates herself for hating them for being afraid.

“You’re not just going to leave me here, are you?” asks Gabrielle, sounding surprised. “I came all this way to see you.”

“That is your problem.” Xena swings into the saddle, but Gabrielle grabs Argo’s reins.

“Hey, I just saved your life,” she snaps up at Xena, fierce, indignant. Demanding. And Xena stares at her. And for all her people’s fear — their unwillingness to stand for anything — might disgust her, Gabrielle’s complete lack of of it is baffling. Isn’t she at all afraid? But Gabrielle just holds her eyes and refuses to back down. Xena groans and reaches down a hand. Gabrielle grabs it without hesitation and scrambles up behind her.

“Where are we going?” she asks, winding her arms around Xena’s waist, as if riding behind infamous warlords is something she does every day.

“To see my brother.”

  


The burial chamber is quiet, but the torches are lit. It’s been years since she was last here, but she still knows the way. Still remembers which tomb is her brother’s. Is Lyceus’s.

She leaves Gabrielle outside with Argo. She doesn’t need an audience for this. She’s still not sure what she’s doing here, exactly, but Lyceus was always the one she was closest to and maybe if she can just talk to him, she’ll be able to find some answers. Be able to know what to do.

There’s dust on the sarcophagus. And for a moment she’s angry. She’s been banished for years and missed him every day and here he lies and no one has even been here recently enough to keep it clean. But maybe that’s not fair. Life has to move forward, after all. Xena is the one who got stuck in the past. In the vengeance.

She blows off the dust, brushes some of the larger pebbles away.

“You always did have trouble keeping your face clean,” she says, mouth twitching to remember the boy who always chased after her. Who always stood up for people. Who never could stand bullies and who followed her into battle against one only to leave her behind forever.

“Since you’ve been gone, I kind of lost my way,” she admits. “Now I’ve found it. I thought I could start over but— they don’t trust me. Not even mother.” She pauses. Swallows. Brushes some more dust off the carved face. “I can’t blame her. She can’t see into my heart. But I’ve got to believe that you can.” She leans in closer, as if somehow Lyceus can hear her. Can understand. Can forgive her where others cannot. “I wish you were here. It’s hard to be alone.”

She didn’t think it would be. Never thought about it at all until suddenly it was just what she was. And then there was no time to think. To feel. To miss. There was just the next battle. The next conquest. The next person to use.

She thought the hardest part of changing sides would be the change itself. Now she thinks it might be the way it doesn’t actually seem to change anything.

“You’re not alone.”

Xena whips around. Gabrielle is standing there in the doorway and how long has she been standing there listening? And for one moment, the rage is overwhelming. How dare she intrude. Bad enough that Gabrielle followed her home, bad enough that she doesn’t have the sense to be afraid, but to do this? Can’t she tell that this is private?

And Gabrielle smiles at her. And it’s open and it’s hopeful and it’s so sincere. Gods above, she actually means it. She’s not thinking about danger and she’s not thinking about private, all she’s thinking is that she sees someone hurting. Sees Xena hurting. And that maybe she can do something about it.

And of course it’s not that simple. It’s never that simple. But to Gabrielle it is. And how do you stay mad at someone who thinks like that?

Xena sighs, and leads the way back outside.

  


They eat up on the hill by the burial chambers. Xena pretends it’s just because it’s time and she’s hungry rather than because she doesn’t know what to do next, but Gabrielle doesn’t seem to notice. Or maybe she’s just not bothered with having a plan.

“It’s so peaceful up here,” she says, eating a piece of bread with cheese. “It must be nice. For the dead, I mean,” she adds, as if Xena asked for clarification, “to have somewhere so nice to come and visit and look out on their descendants from.”

Xena blinks and says nothing. Is that really what she thinks of death? As something nice? Something peaceful?

“We don’t have anything like this back in Potidaea,” Gabrielle continues. “Just small little burial mounds. But they’re not bad. My grandfather is there. Mother says it’s not right, not proper, but sometimes I go out there just to sit and tell him stories. He always used to tell me stories when I was little.”

“Sounds nice.” Is that the right thing to say? Was she supposed to say anything? Gods, she is not used to this— not that it really matters. It’s not as if she’s keeping the girl, after all.

Gabrielle turns to look at her and smiles, bright as anything. “It was,” she says. She takes another bite of her cheese and looks out over the valley again. Then she shifts, turning to face Xena, and leans in.

“So,” she says. “What are we going to do?”

“Do?” Xena echoes, throwing away the bones from her share of the meal and taking out her sword to sharpen it. It’s more out of habit than necessity; she hasn’t had cause to use it that much of late and the edges hold up pretty well.

“Yeah, do,” says Gabrielle. “Will Draco leave Amphipolis alone if he knows you’re not there?”

Xena snorts quietly. “I doubt it.”

“So what are we going to do? I mean, I can talk a cyclops out of eating me, and I can talk your village out of stoning you, but I don’t think I can talk a whole army out of — of —” She pauses and frowns. “Armying?” she tries. “Is that a word?” Another thoughtful pause and then she shrugs. “Anyway, we need a plan, right?”

Xena looks up at her. And the girl is serious, she actually thinks there’s something they can do. Something to be done.

“You talked a cyclops out of eating you?” she says, stalling for time and without really knowing why. There is nothing to be done; Gabrielle finding that out now versus Gabrielle finding that out ten seconds from now makes no difference.

“”Oh, yeah,” Gabrielle says with a grin. “I told him I was hunting you and I would bring him back your eyes to eat. And maybe your legs. We bonded. It was a great relationship.”

Xena raises an eyebrow. “He believed that?”

“Well,” Gabrielle says, still grinning, now with a slightly slyer edge, “he’s not exactly the brightest-burning torch, is he?”

Xena huffs out a breath of something almost laughter and shakes her head. Whatever else Gabrielle is, Xena has to admit she’s got courage.

“Like I said, though,” Gabrielle says, bringing the conversation back, “I don’t really think that’s going to work on this Draco or his army.”

“No,” Xena agrees quietly. “No, it’s really not.” She wishes the girl would drop it. Aren’t things bad enough with her actually having to say it?

“So?” Gabrielle prompts.

“So what?” Her voice comes out hard, harder than she means it to. Harder than she wants it to but Gabrielle doesn’t flinch.

“So what are we going to—”

“There’s nothing I can do!” Xena snaps. “You were there. They won’t listen to me.”

“So make them.”

“I tried that! I tried to tell them, to help them, and they tried to kill me. They don’t want my help. They’d rather see me dead — or be dead themselves — than have anything to do with me!”

Gods, doesn’t the girl understand? She came back to come home, but it’s just not there anymore. Her people don’t trust her and her mother doesn’t want her, they won’t fight with her or let her fight for them or—

And something changes in Gabrielle’s face. Something that makes her suddenly seem much less like the naive girl that she is. Makes her seem so much older, somehow.

“Does that matter?” she asks quietly.

Xena blinks. Sits up. Squares her shoulders. Because the girl is right, she’s absolutely right. Xena came out here looking for answers, but it turns out the answers were right there all along. She just didn’t see them. Wasn’t asking the right questions.

“No,” she says, standing and sheathing her sword. “No it doesn’t.”

She doesn’t argue this time when Gabrielle reaches up a hand to join her on Argo’s back, just pulls her up behind her. Gabrielle’s arms fasten around her waist again and Xena is still sending her home later but for right now maybe it’s not so bad. Maybe it’s okay that she’s here.

“So what are we going to do?” Gabrielle asks again as they move off towards Amphipolis. “You can’t fight an entire army by yourself.”

She’s leaning around, trying to look at Xena’s face, one hand gripping Xena’s shoulder tight for balance, the other still locked around her waist. And she’s strange and impossible and warm against Xena’s back and Xena twists to meet her gaze without thinking about it. Smirks a little; a tiny, smug little smile that actually feels real when Gabrielle grins right back at her.

“Maybe I won’t have to.”

  


She’s not sure where exactly in the fight with Draco the villagers go from hating her to cheering for her. Calling out her name and offering their shoulders for her to stand on. But it happens. They do. And for a moment everything feels right again. This is her town and these are her people and she’s not fighting for profit or glory or power; she’s fighting to protect them.

But when she wins and Draco and his army leave, they try to offer her the loot wagons. And of course it’s not that simple.

She won’t take them, though. Won’t take any kind of reward or thanks for what she did. That’s not why she did it and she won’t make a liar of herself or her people by acting as if it was. _(Those lies were killing her. More than the memories, more than the truth, the lies were what kept getting in the way. And all it took for her to finally realize that was a naive girl barely more than a child standing there and asking the simplest question.)_

She does accept her mother’s forgiveness. It’s the only thing she asks for, though she wouldn’t if Cyrene hadn’t approached her first. And when Cyrene gives it to her, calls her her child again, holds her like she’s never once stopped loving her, Xena almost cries. It’s not why she did it, either. Not something she ever could have demanded. Gabrielle was right; it doesn’t matter. At least, it doesn’t matter in the doing. Doesn’t matter as a reason. The things she does now can’t be about herself.

But that doesn’t mean it’s not important. Doesn’t mean that knowing that her mother can forgive her — has, mostly, will in the future — doesn’t mean the world to her. Because it does. It means more than any reward ever could.

But she can’t stay. Because Gabrielle is still right; what Xena wants can’t matter. She can’t stay here and pretend that the rest of the world doesn’t exist, not anymore. Not if she can go out and help to right the mess of the world that she and others like her have made of it. So she leaves.

And Gabrielle follows her.

Xena supposes by this point she shouldn’t be surprised, but she is. Because what in the name of all of the gods is wrong with the girl?

“You know I’m sending you home in the morning,” she says.

“I won’t stay home,” Gabrielle says simply. “I don’t belong there, Xena. I’m not the little girl my parents wanted me to be.” She sighs and shakes her head. “You wouldn’t understand.”

She won’t stay. She’ll never stay. Xena knows that. Gabrielle might be bored in her little village, but she’s no warrior. She wants to come because it’s exciting. Because she thinks it’s an adventure. Because she’s young and she doesn’t know and she still thinks the world is an amazing place and she wants to see it.

And eventually Xena knows that she’ll see far more than she bargained for and she’ll want out. Want to go home.

But she smiles like she means it and she’s not afraid to argue back and she’s too gods-damned stubborn for Xena to trust her to stay home anyway, and on her own she’ll just get herself killed.

And it is hard, being alone.

“It’s not easy, proving you’re a different person,” she says and Gabrielle looks up at her with that hopeful look and maybe Xena never stood a chance. She huffs and throws a blanket at the girl. “You can sleep over there.”

Gabrielle hesitates, then wraps the blanket around herself. And when Xena looks again she’s still sitting there, just sitting there smiling at her. And Xena can’t quite help but smile back. No, maybe it’s not so bad after all.


End file.
